A pair of legends of Brazilian giants Santos have expressed their massive displeasure with how Santos held up...or failed to...against Barcelona in their recent friendly.
In the match agreed to as part of the Neymar transfer, Barcelona throttled Santos 8-0 at the Nou Camp.
Fittingly, Lionel Messi was the first to score, and substitute Cesc Fabregas picked up a brace. Neymar came on at halftime and had to avoid the wrath of a pitch invader wearing the jersey of Santos rivals Internacional.
Former Santos strikers Pepe and Coutinho both publicly expressed their embarrassment with the scoreline, admitting to Brazilian website Globoesporte Barcelona were always the better side but pleaded with their club to make serious changes to begin competing at the highest level again.
“In our time, it was Santos who did this to other teams” said Pepe, who scored 405 goals during his time at Santos. “Barcelona did as they pleased. We are not used to that. It is unfortunate and sad. Barcelona did well as expected but we didn’t know it would be by a count so huge. We did not think it would be a tragedy.”
Coutinho, who isn’t a stranger to making headlines, went a step further. “Nobody likes that. It was humiliating. The coaches and players have to pack up and go. They have to change the coach and a bunch of players.”
The match was new Barcelona manager Gerardo Martinez’s debut with the club, a fine debut that also saw goals from Alexis Sanchez, Pedro, Adriano, Jean Marie Dongou, and an own goal from Santos left-back Leo to round out the eight scores.
